Event-related Potentials: A new Approach to Studying Object Processing in Infants

This article gives an overview over recent studies using ERPs to explore object identification, object categorization, and social object learning in young infants. Major advantages of ERP-studies over classical looking-time studies are: the short presentation of individual stimuli, and the high temporal resolution of the dependent measure. We identify the Negative Central component (Nc), as well as the Positive Slow Wave (PSW) as ERP-components of special interest. Based on already existing findings, it can be concluded that infants less than 6 months of age are well able to recognize previously seen objects, to abstract new perceptual categories on different levels of abstraction, to identify category membership on the global level, and to use social cues to learn about objects in social context. Hence, object processing includes more than simple perception and discrimination performance.